Creatures on the Loose #22 (March 1973) was a good example of Marvel Comics experimenting with other Sword & Sorcery characters besides Conan. COTL was one of those titles where they could try stuff out and see what stuck. The earlier issues featured Roy Thomas/Berni Wrightson’s King Kull story “The Skull of Silence” before reprinting Kirby monster stories then Gil Kane‘s adaptation of Lt. Gullivar Jones by Edwin A. Arnold (which felt very John Carter of Mars). After Thongor’s run, Man-Wolf take over until the comic was cancelled.
Before the white wolf, Thongor had free rein for eight issues. For this experiment, Roy Thomas would stay over at Savage Sword and Conan the Barbarian and let someone else drive. That person was Science Fiction writer George Alec Effinger, who adapted the works of Thongor’s creator, Lin Carter. Effinger would use one short story and one novel for his base material. (Effinger is intriguing here, because in January 1982 he would begin his series of Sword & Sorcery parodies with “Maureen Birnbaum, Barbarian Swordperson” in Fantasy & Science Fiction. Did his days of doing Thongor fuel some of that?)
In the art department, veteran cover artist Jim Steranko would do the first cover. Val Mayerik would pencil, beginning a long association with Sword & Sorcery for Val. The inker was another veteran of Marvel Comics, Vince Colletta.
This opener is the first half of the Thongor prequel called “Thieves of Zangabal”, which appeared in Hans Stefan Santessan’s The Mighty Barbarians (1969). This tale takes place just before the first novel, The Wizard of Lemuria (1965) also known as Thongor and the Wizard of Lemuria (1969). The story begins with Thongor fighting the city guards. He easily bests them because he is a barbarian from the Valkarthan wastes. In escaping he runs into two thieves who surprise and attack him.
Again under attack, Thongor looks for a place to hide. He chooses the creepy looking tower.
Entering the tower grounds he meets the owner, a wizard. He is Kaman Thuu, a priest of the Seven Gods of Zangabal.
Kaman Thuu offers sanctuary and a job. For twenty gold pieces, he wants Thongor to steal a black mirror from another wizard named Athmar Phong. (This plot may seem familiar. It is a trope I have called “Sword &Sorcery Break & Enter“. Robert E. Howard started it with “Rogues in the House” (Weird Tales, January 1934).
As Thongor contemplates his mission, Effinger gives us a quick flashback to Thongor’s youth where he was captured and made a galley slave. He escaped and became a thief in the streets of Zangabal.
Kaman Thuu gives the barbarian an amulet called the Shield of Cathloda to protect him from Phong’s magic. Thongor goes through a secret tunnel to the house of Athmar Phong and sees many creepy rooms. He finds the mirror without difficulty…
Until he finds a beautiful maiden who is being held hostage. Of course, he must kiss her…My ten year old self who read this back in 1973 had no problem with this. My fourteen old self you re-read this in 1977, nodded my head. Of course, who wouldn’t…
She steals the Shield of Cathloda from the dim-witted barbarian, then turns into…
…a monster! George wisely chooses that point in the story to make me wait a month to find out what happens next!
Looking back over this comic I am struck by many things. The goofy sexy girl ploy of the evil sorcerer seems laughable today but Lin Carter explained it away by saying Thongor was young and naive. (Horny, more like.) Forgetting that, I was impressed by Val Mayerik’s pencils. His action sequences are good. (He had three years of Conan the Barbarian to learn from.) He also has some nice larger panels that really capture the landscape and architecture of Zangabal. Vince Colletta’s inks are dark and moody, which is also appropriate.
Lin Carter describes the monster thusly:
Her limbs blurred, then grew transparent as smoke, then remolded themselves. A ghastly parrot-beak thrust from the warm oval of the girl’s face. Blazing orbs of yellow fire seethed with hellish mockery beneath her arched brows. Her hands became scaly birdclaws, armed with ferocious talons.
I think Val did a pretty good job of drawing that.
I know at my age today, there is tons of nostalgia affecting my opinions around this comic. I think it is on par with the early Roy Thomas/Barry Windsor-Smith Conan. The adaptation is quite faithful to the original story, which must have pleased Lin. The character design for Thongor is quite reminiscent of Kull, not so much Conan. It’s the head band. His cross-band clothing reminds me of John Carter of Mars and Kilraven all at the same time. (The challenge for Val or whoever did the character design was to make him look different from Conan. In this they succeeded but he is definitely a Marvel character.) Thongor’s massive Valkarthan sword has a skull pommel, which I noticed this time around.
Next time: The Thongor comic that changed my life!
